Baltasar Gracián Quotes

Words should be the pledges of work, and, like pawn-tickets, have their market price.

Be open to suggestion, no one is so perfect that they may not need advice from time to time.

Even monarchs have need of authors, and fear their pens more than ugly women the painter's pencil.

To overvalue something is a form of lying.

Be a combination of a dove and the serpent; not a monster, but a prodigy.

The Wise do at once what the Fool does at last. Both do the same thing; the only difference lies in the time they do it: the one at the right time, the other at the wrong. Who starts out with his mind topsyturvy will so continue till the end. He catches by the foot what he ought to knock on the head, he turns right into left, and in all his acts is but a child. There is only one way to get him in the right way, and that is to force him to do what he might have done of his own accord. The wise man, on the other hand, sees at once what must be done sooner

The great art of giving consists in this the gift should cost very little and yet be greatly coveted, so that it may be the more highly appreciated.

We often have to put up with most from those on whom we most depend.

A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends.

When your opponent sees into your reasoning like a lynx, conceal your thoughts like an inky squid.

Let the first impulse pass. Wait for the second.

A person has everything who cares nothing about what matters little.

Know your unlucky days, for the exist. Nothing will work out right and, even though you change your game, your bad luck will remain.

Life is arduous without any breaks, like a long journey without any inns. Learned variety makes it pleasant. Spend the first part of a fine life in communication with the dead. We are born to know and to know ourselves, and books reliably turn us into people. Spend the second part with the living: see and examine all that's good in the world. Not everything can be found in one country; the universal Father has shared out his gifts and sometimes endows the ugliest with the most. Let the third stage be spent entirely with yourself: the ultimate happiness, to philosophize.

Two kinds of people are good at foreseeing danger: those who have learned at their own expense, and the clever people who learn a great deal at the expense of others.